


Forever Is an Awfully Long Time

by Gwynthe



Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Angst, F/M, Human!Bella
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-07
Updated: 2013-03-07
Packaged: 2017-12-04 14:53:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/711968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gwynthe/pseuds/Gwynthe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Edward watches Bella sleep one night and wonders if it was right of him not to change her</p>
            </blockquote>





	Forever Is an Awfully Long Time

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not really a massive fan of Twilight, but this plot bunny attacked me and refused to leave

She is pale, not alabaster like him, just pale and almost transparent. He can see her bones through the folded layers of thin skin and they look fragile, like compressed white dust, ready to fall apart at the lightest touch.

Edward strokes his hand over her hair. Out in the daylight it would shine like silver, reflecting the sun. Now, lying here on their ( _her_ ) bed in the darkness, it's only matte and dull grey.

“You're so…” He means to say beautiful, but somewhere along the way the word changes shape and escapes his mouth as _weak_ , because that's what she is, she's only a human, just a little insignificant thing put out in the world, expected to make it all on her own.

_No_. She is not insignificant; she is his world and his little darling.

“This is what you wanted, remember?” There isn't any bitterness in her voice, it just sounds tired and defeated, but still she stares at him with some sort of _I told you so_ -eyes. Because, he realizes, she always knew this would be the end if he never changed her, despite him thinking that there would always be a day tomorrow; another couple years to wait. She always knew she would grow old and he would stay the same, and he knew that too, but he never really grasped the concept of that until now.

“I…” He didn't think, not this far. He thought, he _knew_ , he would stay with her no matter what and he still stands by that, but this is different. He was prepared to watch her grow old and wrinkly with grey hair. Knew that it would make her uncomfortable when he would trace the lines in her face, but she never understood that the more visible the lines got, the more he loved her. It somehow made him feel more normal.  

What he wasn't prepared for though, was that as she grew older her body got weaker. That though never crossed his mind when he watched her teasing Emmett as playful as ever or the time she fell from the tree trying to climb up after him and she just laughed at her own clumsiness. That's the Bella he fell in love with and even if he loves this old, wrinkly Bella with paper-skin and dark circles under her eyes, and no matter how much he wants it he will never get the young and carefree girl back. All because of his selfish, stubbornness Bella will never be so fresh and _alive_ again, she won't ever run or jump or fight his tickling again. The meaning of never is suddenly so big and he feels so small and pointless not being able to fight it. He _should_ be able to give her all those years back, all those years she spent begging and waiting for him to give in. In trying to give her life, he instead snatched it away from her hands. He could have given her eternity and all she got was a tired body.  

“Bella?” He strokes his thumb across her jaw. Her cheeks stay colourless and her breath doesn't even hitch.

“Yes”

“I was thinking… maybe we could go to the meadow and I could… I could change you.” It was meant as a request, but coming from his lips it sounds like a plea. At some point in his life, when he was younger, that might have wounded his pride a bit, but with Bella he doesn’t care.

“Oh, Edward.” She is sad when she looks at him, so unbearably sad and he wants to take the sadness off her, carry it far away and throw it over the edge of the world, cursing it to faraway galaxies with his damned soul. He wants to make sure she never again feels it, but her eyes tell him he can't, because her sadness isn't for her, it’s for someone else and Edward isn't sure he understands. But he does, he does understand and he wish and hope he doesn't, he begs to God, and Gods he doesn't believe in, that oh-God he doesn't want to understand and please take this burden of understanding away.  

He shakes his head, “No. No, Bella. No. Please no.” he has to tell her that she can’t give up like this, not only accepting death, but even welcoming it. But the words won’t form on his tongue – or at least not the right words, the words that will convince her that life is so much more than this, and now she can finally have all she wanted – so instead he repeats “No, Bella, no, no, no. Please.”

Bella soothes him and presses the flat of her hand on his cheek, “Shhhh, Edward.” she looks into his eyes with determination and her voice is as soft as her lips when they touch his forehead in a tender and warm kiss. Then with a clear and steady voice she says “We’ll talk about it in the morning, yeah? I’m tired now and I want to sleep.” Almost as an afterthought she adds, “I’m not going anywhere.” with a low, but steady voice full of promises, before the warm and oh-so light press of Bella’s hand disappears as she curls a bit up into herself and closes her eyes.

For a few minutes Edward lies in silence, watching her eyelids flutter restlessly, waiting for her to be dragged further and further away from him and this night and into worlds of her own creation, where hopefully she has everything she wants and no one is denying her anything.

At last, her chest start to rise and fall in a deep set rhyme and her breath comes in long heavy drags, Edward rolls over on his back staring up at the ceiling. Even after all the years he’s spent this way, lying beside a sleeping Bella in the night just listening to her breath, he never gets tired of it. He would willingly spend hundreds of years like this. The rhythmic sound of her heart beating calmly in her chest is the most wonderful thing he’s ever heard in his entire life. It never seize to amazing that the beating sound that means safe to him, is the only thing keeping his most precious Bella alive.

It’s strange really, how he’s seen so much of the world, been to so many places, met so many people, even tasted human blood and none of that has ever made him feel the way the human beside him has. All those memories and adventures he could have given up just to spend forever with Bella. He’s been so lucky to have done all those things and still have this beautiful creature with him, trusting him enough to sleep so peaceful beside him.

It doesn’t matter anymore that his soul is damned, because he’s never going to Hell. He’s going to live forever with Bella by his side and they’re never going to die.

The room is quiet. Not a sound is heard, not even the beating of a heart. 

“Bella!” He rolls over on his side. “Isabella!”

_No-no-no-no-no-no_. Quickly he’s on his hands and knees, hovering over her silent body. He shakes her, trying to be careful, but it's difficult restraining himself when he sees the way her head bob back and forth. Carlisle had taught him what to do in a situation like this, _just in case_. Edward tries to remember, but all he can think of is Bella's body lying _unmoving_ in front of him. There was something about restarting the heart wasn't it? He has to…

In a rush he places his hands upon her chest over her _not beating_ heart. Slowly he starts to press, up and down. One, two, three, four, not stopping when he reach thirty, only pressing harder and faster. The sudden sound of something shattering is loud and sharp in the too quiet room. He snaps out of his _press harder-faster_ daze.  

He's not going to give up, he can still save her.

With swift hands he tears her sleeping gown apart and sinks his teeth into her flesh, as close as possible to her heart. Letting the teeth sink deep into her, the taste of her blood seems unfamiliar and strange on his tongue. As quickly as they sank into the skin, the teeth are snatched out.

Then he places his hands over her _soon beating_ heart again. This time he is harder, forgetting all about her being a human. His hands break through her ribs as he stares intently at her face. _Save her, save her_ is the only thing on his mind. He can’t lose her, not yet. They were meant to have forever.

It's not until the rusty smell fills his nostrils, that he realizes he's broken through her thin skin. Mixed feelings of shock and disgust shoots through him as he looks down at his own hands buried deep in the dead body, between shattered ribs and blood and flesh. There is something between the broken bones. He recognizes it. It’s a heart. It's her heart. And it's not beating. It's _not_ beating. Not beating.

The realization of it pushes up his throat and he chokes on it. The last five desperate minutes summoned up in one dry sob. It feels like he should be gasping for breath, but he can't do that,  instead it grows like a soreness through him. His eyes feel dry and painful, so he tries to close them, to wet them just a bit, but it doesn't work. Bella's dead, and he couldn't save her. Bella's dead.

_No, she can't be. It can't be real_. But the aching in his chest is there to remind him that it is, that there is no escaping this, that Bella's never going to smile at him ever again. His limbs feel dead and _tired_ and still so strong and powerful.

He gets up from the bed and doesn’t bother to wash the blood off himself. First, his hand goes through the window and the wall; it tears the door off its hinges. Glass and plates shatter on the floor and Bella's favourite mug hits the wall. Pictures still in their frames are torn apart. The bathroom-mirror goes to thousand shiny, red pieces and Edward's hand doesn't even get a scratch, as a cruel reminder of just how _dead_ alive he really is. 

He's dead and still he's alive, he doesn't need a beating heart and he can't die of broken heart, despite how much he prays for it. Death is in his nature and still it isn't. It's never something he will meet with open arms, ready to pass on beyond this shadow of a life. To him, death is something that must be forced. And if it is forced it won't bring him to Bella, isn’t that what they taught him, that to kill yourself is the certain way to Hell? Death can only bring him peace, but never Bella. 

The thought of it is so heavy that it’s enough to drag him down on floor, among heaps of broken glass; to make him curl up in a tight ball, clenching his arms hard around his legs as he screams his useless heart out into his knees. 


End file.
